Nutrition

Rilke Schule Nutrition Policy

Students bring their own lunches and eat either in their classrooms or the gymnasium. Rilke Schule has a healthy food policy. No candy, cookies, cake, puddings or other sugary food is allowed in lunches or snacks; no soda or drinks other than water, milk or 100% fruit juices are allowed. The reasons for healthy lunches will be made clear to the students in their nutrition curriculum.

Sharing of food among students is not permitted at Rilke Schule.

Our new Nutrition pamphlet has great ideas for lunch for your children. Print it out and fold the page in half into a pamphlet, or read the information below.

Eat Smart! Be Healthy!

At Rilke Schule we believe in healthy living through eating nutritious food and engaging in regular exercise. We have compiled this information to help our parents prepare healthy snacks and lunches for their children. The goal of our nutrition policy is to help parents develop lifelong healthy eating habits with their children. Teach your children about healthy foods—wholegrains, vegetables, fruits and milk as the foundation of their diet for healthy living. Important things to avoid are foods high in corn syrup, sugar, sodium, fat and other processed ingredients. There are many great resources out there to help you learn about food labeling and healthy food. Be sure to check outwww.fda.gov/Food/LabelingNutrition/ConsumerInformation/ucm078889.htm and other resources for more information. Another excellent site that has nutrition activities and games for children is (http://www.gourmetgiftbaskets.com/Interactive-Nutrition-Games-For-Kids.asp).

If children bring inappropriate food for lunch to school, teachers will ask children to return it to their lunch boxes and save it for the afternoon after they have left Rilke Schule.

Need more ideas? Checkout: http://kidshealth.org/ Send in your ideas for healthy lunches to info@rilkeschule.org and we will add them to the school website!!
Read food labels carefully and skeptically
Look for hidden sugars! If you are concerned about your intake ofsugars, make sure that added sugars are not listed as one of the first few ingredients. Ingredients are listed in the order of their proportion in theproduct. Hence, sugars can bedistributed among the other ingredients to avoid showing large quantities inthe first three ingredients. For example, Yogos are really just little balls ofcorn syrup with fruit flavoring. Other names for added sugars include: cornsyrup, high-fructose corn syrup, fruit juice concentrate, maltose, dextrose, sucrose, honey, and maple syrup.Your healthy child doesn’t need processed sugars in her diet! Teach her not to eat them now, and you have given her healthy eating habits for life.

“All Natural” doesn’t mean what you think
The Food and Drug Administration does not regulate those claims,hence there is no official definition of “all natural”. “All natural” fooditems often have been altered by non-natural processes (i.e, foods fried athigh temperatures) with added chemical ingredients such as salt or MSG.All-purpose flour is natural, but the wheat berries are milled, stripped of nutrients, and then the flour is bleached and “enriched” with synthetic chemical vitamins, and thus has little original nutritional value.

What does “organic” mean?
The word”organic” refers to the way farmers grow and process agricultural products, such as fruits, vegetables, grains, dairy products and meat. Organic farming practices are designed to encourage soil and water conservation and to reduce pollution. Farmers who grow organic produce and meat don’t use conventional methods to fertilize, control weeds or prevent livestock disease. For example, rather than using chemical weedkillers, organic farmers conduct sophisticated crop rotations and spread mulch or manure to keep weeds at bay. The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has established an organic certification program that requires all organic foods to meet strict government standards.These standards regulate how such foods are grown, handled and processed. Anyfarmer or food manufacturer who labels and sells a product as organic must be USDA certified as meeting these standards. Products that are completely organic — such as fruits, vegetables, eggs or other single-ingredient foods — are labeled 100 percent organic and can carry a small USDA seal. Foods that have more than one ingredient, such as breakfast cereal, can use the USDA organic seal or the following wording on their package labels, depending on the number of organic ingredients:

100 percent organic. Products that are completely organic or made of all organic ingredients.

Organic. Products that are at least 95 percent organic.

Made with organic ingredients. These are products that contain at least 70 percent organic ingredients. The organic seal can’t beused on these packages.

Foods containing less than 70 percent organic ingredients can’t use the organic seal or the word “organic” on their product label. They can, however, include the organic items in their ingredient list.

Soft Drinks (Soda Pop)are a problem not only for what they contain, but for what they push out of the diet. Heavy soft drink consumption, diet OR regular, is associated with lower intake of important vitamins, minerals, and dietary fiber. The empty calories of soft drinks are likely contributing to health problems, particularly overweight and obesity. Frequent consumption of soft drinks may also increase the risk of osteoporosis—especially in people who drink soft drinks instead of calcium-rich milk. Dental experts continue to urge that people drink less soda pop, especially between meals, to prevent tooth decay (due to the sugars) and dental erosion (due to the acids). To learn more, visit: http://www.cspinet.org/liquidcandy/

Salt
A high salt diet in childhood leads to higher blood pressure and an increased risk of stroke and heart disease. Reducing the salt content in kids’foods will help train their taste buds not to want salty foods as adults. Many people believe that if they stop using a salt shaker that will make all thedifference. It’s a good start. Limiting salt shaker use may help, butprocessed and restaurant food account for more than three-quarters of all sodium intake.The best choice is to limit processed foods. But, in our busy lives, making a home-cooked meal is not always realistic. So, when you have to use processed foods, read the Nutrition Facts label on food packages and compare the sodium content of similar products. You’d be surprised how often different brands have very different sodium levels, yet still taste good!

Ramen Noodles These noodles are a quick and an inexpensive way of eating, but they are not a substitute for a healthy meal. They are very high in sodium and should not be on the list of regular food items. For example, Marchuan Ramen NoodleSoup “Chicken Flavor” contains, per serving, (=½ block of noodles with seasoning) 780 mg of sodium. The recommended range is 1,500 and 2,400 milligrams (mg) a day for healthy adults. That’s half your salt intake for an entire day, and way too much for kids, so forego the seasoning on the noodles!

Here are some great websites with helpful nutrition information for kids: